A Harvard scientist claims they are in a process of creating woolly mammoths embryo for years now. It is a woolly/elephant hybrid. Woolly mammoths were extinct relatives of today’s elephants. They lived during the last ice age and may have died due to climate change. Humans take part in their extinction due to hunting.

The team has been collecting DNA from frozen mammoth specimens. They aim for rebirth woolly mammoths and probably have a living woolly mammoth. The scientist specified DNA sequence such as fat level, size, hair and blood. One at a time, they cut and pasted these DNA sequences into that of Asian elephants. Asian elephants are the closest relatives of woolly mammoths living today.

Previous attempts were not successful because sperm cells last only a few years before becoming nonviable. However, the team collected skin cells from Asian elephants and set them up as stem cells. After that they plan to insert a modified embryo, combining woolly mammoth with Asian elephant DNA. It will be placed into an artificial womb.

If all the procedure was done with no error, it is expected to have a baby mammoth/elephant born after two years. Professor George Church, the leader of the Harvard team said that they are working on the ways to evaluate the possible impact of the genetic editing. According to The Guardian, wooly mammoths have disappeared from the face of the earth 4,000 years ago. Church predicts that the success of this breakthrough will be complete after 10 years. He also believes that this is a new and good improvement towards genetic engineering.

According to the Sputnik, because mammoth live in very cold places the preservation of their genetic materials were able to survive. Geneticists worldwide was trying to recreate the woolly mammoth for years now. The woolly mammoth genes was shown to the public by American and Swedish scientist in 2015.